


Paint - (Since when was chaos healthy?)

by bisexualwatson



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Artist Sherlock Holmes, BAMF Irene Adler, Cliche, Irene Adler Ships Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Jealous Sherlock, John Watson Plays Rugby, John in Denial About His Sexuality, M/M, Pining Sherlock Holmes, Possessive Sherlock, Teenlock, mrs hudson is a legend, the most iconic friendship group
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 19:33:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21993844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bisexualwatson/pseuds/bisexualwatson
Summary: 'Paint is just a distraction,' he looked away, dismissing the canvas as if it were a five year old's sketch.'But this, this is amazing,' the boy smiled, eyes gleaming with a blue that Sherlock suddenly felt an urge to immortalise in oils.And suddenly Sherlock wasn't sure the paint would just be a distraction anymore.
Relationships: Irene Adler/Molly Hooper, Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade, Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25





	Paint - (Since when was chaos healthy?)

**Author's Note:**

> hi!  
> hope you all enjoy this chaotic mess of teenage pining, love, hate, not knowing where the lines you aren't supposed to cross are, and how not to fall in love - starring sherlock holmes and john watson.  
> i also write headcanons for this universe on my tumblr  
> teenlocked.tumblr.com  
> go check them out :)
> 
> this chapter is a short insight into sherlock's world before we get into the actual plot :)

The morning dawns on the city of London, cold and miserable, sky painted Payne’s grey, the colour seeping through the curtains of Sherlock Holmes’ bedroom and slowing drenching his room in the horrible light he doesn’t need to see at the moment. Blinking open his eyes, he flicks a lock of hair out of his face, and surveys the monotonous scenery that is his attic room. He rethinks for a moment, because it is in fact far from monotonous - chaotic even; random smudges of paint everywhere; canvases piled high in corners, some snapped in half - left to perish on a chair or in a box, some balanced intricately on sort of half made easels, dry but never finished, the walls painted shades of clashing colours, the beams of the ceiling intricately patterned in colours that only insomnia could reach for. It is monotonous though, monotonous chaos that loses its colour as soon as it becomes part of the routine. Sherlock sits up, stretching his arms back onto the sides of his bed frame - pale skin hiding the prussian blue veins that lay beneath. The shade of his skin is almost white against the clashing lurid pink and yellow that he’d painted the old oak of his bed some sleepless night. He laughs - a hollow, futile sound, and surveys the colours of his walls, all fighting with each other, screaming for attention, and looks at the ceiling - colours creeping in on it, most of it left pure and unpainted, snowy white bright above the myriad of chaos below. He makes a mental note to go and buy some grey paint. 

Stepping over the discarded palettes on the floor, he made his way over to the drawers that held his few items of clothing. It was an antique - according to Mycroft - which made Sherlock even more determined to make it as loud as possible, get it to stand out even in his room. It was constantly being added to. Whenever a new shade of paint was brought home, it was added to the dresser. Sherlock considered it his catalogue, perfectly chaotic, so difficult to decipher and yet so easily understandable if one thought for a second that perhaps the least mentally strenuous solution is not, in fact, the correct one. 

Colours are simple. So simple. And when your mind can never turn off, not even for a second there is a strange, comfortable beauty in simplicity. Even when it’s layered into something chaotic and problematic and horrible, it's still simple. And that was why Sherlock loved colour, loved layering it until everything fell into one, until only he understood what the layers meant, until nobody could decipher it, nobody could see through his mind. 

Sherlock loved colours because they were a simple thing that could be made endlessly complex to normal people. 

Sherlock painted for only him to see, and if one day the world wanted to fail at deciphering what he meant by those colours they could try their best.

Because he knew he would never paint something that meant anything to anyone, let alone him.

Paint was just a medium to make everyone shut up.

Paint was just a distraction.


End file.
